Why Yorubas are not keen on 2023 – Ayo Adebanjo

Chief of Afenifere, Chief Ayo Adebanjo, has given reasons the Yoruba are not keen in the 2023 elections.

The elder statesman, who noted that the present move by the National Assembly to review the constitution is diversionary,  insisted that the country must be restructured.

In this interview with Sunday Sun, he also spoke on a range of issues affecting the stability of the country.  Excerpt:

The National Assembly is about to commence another review of the 1999 Constitution. Is that the way to go now?

When I talk, these people will say I don’t believe in them. It is diversionary; they are just buying time. All we are asking for is restructuring. I have tasked President Muhammadu Buhari on this before. If you believe that the Confab of 2014 is okay, but you are not the one who did it, take out what is wrong in it and put what you think is right so that we can move forward. If not, set up your own committee and let the right thing be done. How can we be reviewing the constitution we don’t believe in? You review something you have done before to amend it. But this one needs a surgical operation. I may not oppose this one, if only we can arrive at the same point. But I don’t believe in it. I believe they just want to keep us talking till another election and I don’t believe in any election in this country until this constitution is reviewed. While they will like to keep us talking, we will not waste time with it. We will give them what they want. If they can do it within three weeks, it is okay. Inasmuch as we arrive at the same destination, it is okay with me.  But I don’t trust them. Everybody believes the constitution is not working. Why can they set up a committee to take a review of the previous recommendations and sieve it within three or four months? The review they are talking about is a time-wasting procedure, it is a diversion. If they want to do it, let them complete it within three months and then we move forward. My position is that this assembly cannot review the constitution because the assembly itself is a product of the constitution we are condemning. So, they can’t be in a position to review it. But if they mean well, they can do it in a way the people want. Whatever method they want to use, just get us back to true federalism. The question of electoral law, the question of population, the question of revenue allocation, are all embedded in the issue of restructuring. So, if they are sincere about it, they should go to the recommendations we had made before and get on with it. Any other way, I believe, is time-wasting.  There is no sincerity in it.

If the National Assembly succeeds in amending the constitution leading to true federalism, do you see Buhari assenting to it?

If he feels it is important, he can sign it. All we want is true federalism. The goal is federalism, not structured federalism, not federalism of Nigeria character. There is nothing like that. Federalism is federalism. Everything we are clamouring for is embedded in it. And that is the way out. You can’t give us a guarded federalism. All the elements in federalism must be done. The questions of local government autonomy, state police, resource control and so on must all be addressed. Anything short of what is contained in federal system is unacceptable.

What is your opinion about the Water Resources Bill that is before the National Assembly?

It is still part of the problem of our constitution. We have already said that the power at the centre is too much under a multi-ethnic society, they are now adding to it. When I said the man has no integrity, people are quarrelling with me. They said that the language was too strong. A man has integrity, but can’t keep to his words. Under this present regime, restructuring is in APC constitution. He just wants to keep us talking. He does not want to relieve himself of dictatorial power. And I have said it before; under the present constitution, Nigeria’s president is the most powerful president in the whole world. Buhari is not ready to concede that power, he just wants to keep us talking until another election. Anybody who is talking about doing another election without going back to federalism is just wasting his time. You do another election under this constitution, you go back again. They will rig it and tell you to go to court and the court will confirm it. I have been in this game when Buhari was a toddler. So, he can’t deceive me. I joined the Action Group (AG) in 1950. That is 70 years ago and Buhari is 74 now. Then, he was a toddler that time. So, I know what I am talking about. If anybody wants to be deceived, including the Yoruba APC, I can’t be deceived. When we say people should go back to the previous constitution, they should go back to the constitution Awolowo, Azikwe, and Sardauna agreed upon at independence. I put these questions to Buhari: Are you more intelligent than Sardauna? Are you more educated than Sardauna? Are you more Fulani than Sarduana? He has not answered my questions. I have been repeating these over and again, not Femi Adesina or Garba Shehu has responded to me. They would have shut me up, but they know. They pretend as if they don’t know anything about it. But whenever they want to insult us, they will say they don’t know what those clamouring for restructuring are talking about, including Vice President, Prof Yemi Osinbajo, who took Obasanjo to court over the issue of restructuring when he was Attorney-General of Lagos State. It’s a gang up. They are deceiving themselves, deceiving the country. The corruption they said they would wipe out is growing bigger and bigger. The looting is growing higher and higher more than what we had under the regime of the late General Sani Abacha. I have passed the stage where anybody will be tossing me around.

What is your take on the issue of power rotation?

Review the constitution first and other things will follow. Everybody believes if you don’t follow the North, you can’t get to power because of their population which I have said is fraudulent and they have not refuted me. The colonial people rigged the population census for them and they have not denied it. And that is why they will tell you that politics is a game of number. Which number? Rigged number! All that will crumble under restructuring. That is why they don’t want to do it. It is only in this country that everything goes against the knowledge of geography which says the nearer the desert, the fewer the population. In America, in Switzerland, in Russia, in India, anywhere in the world, the nearer the desert, the fewer the population. But in Nigeria, the reverse is the case. That is why we have problem in this country. I tell you, Buhari does not care about keeping this country together. All leaders of opinion in the country, including Olusegun Obasanjo, Ibrahim Babangida, Abdulsalami Abubakar, Afe Babalola, have talked about the need to change this constitution. He doesn’t want to shift ground. Is that a listening leader? And they say he is a democrat.

How would you react to the plan by the Fulani herdsmen to establish their own vigilante group throughout Nigeria?

It is unacceptable. They are just looking for trouble. That is part of Fulanisation that we have been talking about. You are an oppressor, you are a trespasser and you want to establish vigilante throughout the country. How does that sound? It shows they are insensitive to people’s reaction. It’s unfortunate.

In the midst of COVID-19 challenges, the Federal Government has continued to impose more and more economic hardship on the people. The latest being the sudden increase in the pump price of petrol from N148 to N152 per litre and also electricity tariff increased from N21 per Kwh to N63. How do you view these developments?

All along, I have said that this man has no clue to our problem either political or economic. It shows the insensitivity of any head of government to increase price at this time of Coronavirus pandemic. Common sense dictates you do things that will cushion the effects of the pandemic on the people. Instead of doing that, they are adding to it. It confirms the incompetence of Buhari’s government. He can’t protect lives, he can’t protect property. He is just going from one error to the other. The only solution is for God to help us get rid of him as early as possible.

But the fear is that he might want to supplant himself with another stooge as his successor?         

It is now left for the people to react. You don’t need a soothsayer to tell us that the man is driving us to the precipice. But what can people like me do at 92 if those that are being oppressed are not reacting? We are on our ways to the grave. We have said it time and again that he does not have intelligence and patriotism to rule us and weld the country together. All that he is doing has confirmed our fears and what we have said about him. It is now left for the people to accept or react and say, no, enough is enough.

In the present circumstance, will the Yoruba agitation for 2023 which is being led by the APC leader in the Southwest not spell further doom for the country?

Just say Tinubu and his cohorts. The Yoruba are not keen on 2023. What the Yoruba want is a change of this constitution before any other thing. No Yoruba will talk of 2023 without restructuring the country. Any Yoruba man who claims to be talking for the Yoruba without a change of the present constitution is a sellout. What the Yoruba want now with the rest of the country is to change this constitution first. We cannot have another election under an oppressive constitution we have now, a constitution that is depriving us of our rights. Patriotic Yoruba want a change of the constitution now. The question of presidency is a deceit between President Buhari and Asiwaju.

Are you saying that the power should remain with the North?

No question about 2023 until this constitution is changed; 2023 is a diversion and I am not one of those who are going to be diverted. We say we want to change the constitution; you are talking of election under the same constitution. Are we fools? The issue now as far as the Yoruba are concerned is to change this constitution under which we are being oppressed and sidelined. Let us change the constitution to what we had at independence. That is the clarion call of the Yoruba.  Anybody in Yoruba land that is talking of 2023 is a sellout. He is unpatriotic.

The sun